While MLB’s lockout means baseball in the United States has descended to the is-Jon-Lester-a-Hall-of-Famer level of purgatory, the KBO has been going swimmingly. As of this writing, all available free agents have signed, and only one team, the Doosan Bears, is without a third foreign player on its roster. And with the chances of a blockbuster trade extremely slim, I thought now would be a good time to recap what happened in the KBO this winter.

I’m doing this in order of the regular season standings, so Part 1 will discuss 2021’s top five teams, while Part 2 will deal with the remaining five. Without further ado, here’s the latest news on baseball in Korea:

Team Notes

KT Wiz
As defending champions, the Wiz only needed to maintain a certain amount of talent on their roster to have another shot at contending – and that’s exactly what they’ve accomplished. William Cuevas 쿠에바스 and Odrisamer Despaigne 데스파이네 both agreed to return on one-year deals, which is great news for the Wiz: Their rotation last season ranked first in ERA and innings pitched by a wide margin. Notably, Despaigne has tossed 396.1 innings since joining the Wiz in 2020, meaning even if he’s a bit rustier in 2022, he’ll still anchor what projects to be a deep staff.

Replacing Jared Hoying 호잉 in the outfield is Henry Ramos, who most recently appeared in 18 games for the Arizona Diamondbacks, hitting for a paltry 48 wRC+ before getting outrighted from the 40-man roster in October. But he absolutely raked in Triple-A (.371/.439/.582), and if there’s anything we’ve learned from his predecessors, it’s that minor league stats can be a reliable predictor of KBO success. Read the rest of this entry »

Elijah Dunham had a promising first professional season in the New York Yankees system. Signed as a non-drafted free agent following 2020’s COVID-shortened five-round draft, the 23-year-old Indiana University product slashed .263/.362/.463 with 13 home runs in 395 plate appearances between Low-A Tampa and High-A Hudson Valley. He proceeded to rake in the Arizona Fall League. In 101 plate appearances with the Surprise Saguaros, the left-handed hitting Dunham went deep twice while slashing a stand-up-and-take-notice .357/.465/.571.

Dunham — an Honorable Mention on our newly-released Yankees Top Prospects list — discussed his disappointing draft-day experience, and the developmental strides he’s made since entering pro ball, late in the Arizona Fall League season.

———

David Laurila: What were your conversations with teams leading into the draft?

Elijah Dunham: “A handful of [scouts] told me they were probably going to take me in the fourth or the fifth. My agent thought I was probably going to go somewhere in the fifth. But then, when draft day rolled around, he called and said ‘Hey, I think we fell out.’ In my mind, I was like, ‘There’s no way.’ But it happened.”

Laurila: Did your agent get calls on draft day, asking if you’d sign for X amount if you were taken in whatever round?

Dunham: “I didn’t even talk to my agent about it, because I was pretty distraught. But I had one call come straight to me, from the area scout, with their pick coming up. He asked if I’d take so-and-so amount, and I said, ‘Yeah, definitely.’ It just never happened.”

Laurila: Which team was that? Read the rest of this entry »

On the surface, popups may seem a bit mundane. Typically, the ball isn’t even visible on the broadcast and they are nearly always converted into outs. Nearly always isn’t always, though, and dropped popups are a treat to behold. And even if you aren’t lucky enough to see one actually drop, plenty of weird things can happen on plays that start off routine:

Since it’s the middle of the offseason, I thought it would be a good time to take a closer look at the popups of 2021. I don’t want just any old popups, though. I want the best of the best — the popups that cause players to lose their feet, the ones that make the crowd “ooh” and “aww” as the ball simply refuses to come down.

The easiest way to find these sky-scraping popups is to base our search off of exit velocity, as balls hit harder will go higher. An exit velocity of at least 97 mph seemed like a good cutoff point. Any lower, and the popups would start to feel less impressive; any higher, and the sample wouldn’t be large enough to satiate my desire to watch this sort of play. That cutoff left me with 126 popups representing the hardest 1.5% of popups hit this season (if you’d like to follow along, you can find the whole batch here on Baseball Savant). Read the rest of this entry »

Brent Suter shouldn’t be this good. Honestly, he shouldn’t even be good, period. He throws a fastball in the mid-80s, and he throws it a lot. He complements it with a changeup and a curveball, but neither of those pitches are excellent. No, it’s mostly a slow fastball; among pitchers who threw at least 50 innings last year, Suter had the fourth-highest fastball frequency (77.1%). If you’re Richard Rodríguez (No. 2 on the list) or Jake McGee (No. 1), sure, fire away. But Brent Suter? It feels like a recipe for failure — and yet, it keeps working for him.

Why? I decided to investigate it, because frankly, I like oddities. Do you really need to read about how Max Scherzer succeeds by throwing multiple excellent pitches with pinpoint control? Probably not; he’s just great. But Suter throws BP fastballs and embarrasses hitters. Look at this:

That’s crazy — I didn’t know Jace Peterson could play first base!
Read the rest of this entry »

Blake Brown had an uninspiring transcript when he signed as a non-drafted free agent with the Philadelphia Phillies in 2020. In four collegiate seasons at the University of North Carolina-Asheville, the 23-year-old right-hander had logged a 4.99 ERA and been credited with just six wins and eight saves. He had a psychology degree in his back pocket, but outside of a promising fastball, little in the way of baseball bona fides.

Based on his first professional season, the Phillies may have secured a diamond-in-the-rough. In 34 relief outings — 33 with High-A Jersey City and one with Double-A Reading — Brown fanned 59 batters and allowed just 22 hits over 41 innings of work. Walks were an issue — he issued 36 free passes — but his ERA was a laudable 3.07, and his batting-average-against a Lilliputian .155.

Brown — No. 31 on our newly-released Phillies Top Prospects list — discussed his draft experience and his emergence as an up-and-coming arm in a recent phone interview.

———

David Laurila: You were a non-drafted senior sign. What were your draft expectations, both in your junior and senior years?

Blake Brown: “My junior year, I thought there was a decent chance that I’d get drafted, but they weren’t especially high expectations. I didn’t have the greatest year. But my senior year, going into the five-round draft, I thought that I was… not guaranteed, but I was more certain that I would at least get a call. And I did get a couple of calls during the draft, with some money on the table. Things just never panned out.”

Laurila: Why didn’t things pan out?

Brown: “So, a couple of the teams called and said, ‘Hey, would you take X amount of money in the next round?’ Before the draft, it was ‘Would you take X amount of money if we were drafting you today?’ I would say ‘yes.’ But when that round came and the team’s name popped up, it was never my name getting called. I think it was a matter of teams having someone on their board that they didn’t expect to be there, and they were like, ‘OK, we’ve got to hop on that.’”

Laurila: Where did the Phillies fit into the equation? Read the rest of this entry »

Back in December, I wrote about Cedric Mullins’ breakout 2021 season, the catalyst for which was a decision to stop switch-hitting and begin batting exclusively from the left side of the plate. By dropping his right-handed swing, Mullins, a natural lefty, could focus on honing one swing instead of struggling to maintain two separate swings.

Switch-hitting has always been a rare skill throughout baseball history, but the number of batters who can swing both ways has dwindled in recent years. From that previous piece:

In 2021, just 17 qualified batters (13.1%) were switch-hitters, right in line with the league-wide average over the last decade. Compare that to the decade between 1986 and ’95 (excluding the strike-shortened 1994 season), when more than one in five qualified batters (21.1%) hit from both sides, with a peak of 24.8% in ’89. With modern baseball strategy so heavily emphasizing the platoon advantage, it’s surprising to see so few switch-hitters these days. Giving up that advantage in every at-bat is a radical decision, and there’s barely any precedent for it.

The number of players who have dropped switch-hitting after making their major league debuts is tiny. J.T. Snow did it in 1999, halfway through his career. So did Orlando Merced in 1996. Shane Victorino flip-flopped between switch-hitting and batting right-handed after injuries forced him to give up left-handed batting at various points during his career. More recently, Tucker Barnhart gave up switch-hitting in 2019.

After seeing the success Mullins had after giving up swinging from the right side, the obvious follow-up question is whether we can identify any other switch-hitters who might benefit from focusing on swinging from one side or the other.

The extremely small number of players who have actually made the decision to stop switch-hitting at the major league level should tell us that this isn’t a silver bullet solution to a player with a wide platoon split. Anecdotally, more players stop switch-hitting in the minors because they have a lot more to gain if the adjustment pays off. For those players who have already made it to the majors but haven’t truly established themselves, like Mullins, it’s a risky decision. They’d be making the change against the best the sport has to offer, likely resulting in a significant adjustment period. Still, with teams focused on finding every miniscule advantage to wring out of their rosters, it’s a worthwhile question to pursue.
Read the rest of this entry »

Writing about baseball isn’t the most predictable task. I often don’t know what my topic will be until the dust settles, hours after rummaging through a pile of numbers that, at first glance, makes little sense. For example, this article started off as an inquiry into Darin Ruf. Of all the journeymen to stop by the KBO, experience a resurgence, and return stateside, he’s by far enjoying the greatest success – who would have guessed?

As a right-handed hitter, Ruf’s primary asset is a knack for mashing lefty pitchers. He can hold his own against righty pitchers, too, posting a 126 wRC+ against them last season. But detractors might point to a .386 BABIP that buoyed much of that production. In other words, one could expect Ruf to become a bit more… rough in the future (sorry). A quick search reveals that he had a higher groundball rate against righties compared to lefties, which doesn’t bode well for future success, and not much else. The critics win this round.

Here’s the thing, though – he wasn’t alone. It turns out that in 2021, right-handed hitters had a higher groundball rate against right-handed pitchers; conversely, they had a lower groundball rate against left-handed pitchers. You can see for yourself:

This is also true of left-handed hitters. Facing same-handed pitchers led to more groundballs, while opposite-handed pitchers led to, well, the opposite. The gap in groundball rate by pitcher handedness is greater for lefty hitters, though that may be influenced by the relatively few instances of lefty-versus-lefty matchups. Still, the difference, which appears on a league-wide scale, is significant enough to warrant an investigation. Read the rest of this entry »

The week before Christmas, I conducted an investigation into the Giants’ strange sinker-ballers. Logan Webb and Alex Wood enjoyed spectacular years, and they both did it using sinkers they released from a low starting point, which created a unique look for batters.

You probably didn’t read that article, and that’s okay. It was the peak of the holiday season. You were likely out in the world like me – seeing family, drinking eggnog-flavored coffee beverages, and generally making up for last year. My consumption of baseball media went way down, and I do this for a living.

As a self-interested person, I suggest you go back and read that article. I thought it was pretty good! More importantly, though, I’ve been doing more research into what the heck a “flat sinker” even is. The concept just doesn’t fit into my brain, and when that happens, I like to hit myself over the head with data until something clicks. So today, please enjoy some random things I’ve researched while trying to understand why in the world “flat” (approach angle) and “sinker” (pitch type) coexist. Read the rest of this entry »

When Buster Posey announced his retirement in early November, my first thought was something along the lines of “Fantastic career; he’ll be getting my vote when he becomes Hall of Fame eligible in five years.” Looking back, that initial reaction actually undersold just how dominant Posey was over his 12-year career.

A few days ago, I shared the following on social media:

Best catchers in baseball history: 1. Mickey Cochrane, 2. Johnny Bench, 3. Josh Gibson, 4. Yogi Berra, 5. Gary Carter, 6. Ivan Rodriguez.

Your opinion of that ranking aside, a follower proceeded to ask for my opinion of Posey. That prompted me to compare the 34-year-old’s career to that of Cochrane, who likewise was done at a relatively-early age. Cochrane played his last game shortly after his 34th birthday, an errant Bump Hadley pitch — this in the days before hitters wore helmets — having fractured his skull and rendered him unconscious for 10 days. Coincidentally or not, Cochrane had taken Hadley deep in his previous at bat.

Cochrane played from 1925-1937 — a high-offense era — and finished his career with an eye-popping .320/.419/.478 slash line. Perusing our WAR leaderboard for that baker’s-dozen stretch, you’ll find Cochrane sandwiched between Rogers Hornsby and Tony Lazzeri. In 1947, Cochrane became the first catcher voted into the Hall of Fame by the BBWAA.

Cochrane played in 1,482 games. Posey played in 1,371 games. How do they otherwise compare? Read the rest of this entry »

Coming off of a disappointing last-place finish in the AL Central, the Twins made it clear that they were looking to compete in 2022. That would seemingly require them to rebuild their starting rotation after trading away José Berríos last season, losing Kenta Maeda to Tommy John surgery, and the departure of Michael Pineda via free agency. But as the rest of the baseball world was gobbling up free agents with a fervor that can only happen when Thanksgiving and an impending lockout collide, they were seldom heard from and hardly involved on some of the top arms. Maybe this should’ve been expected given their lack of history spending on pitchers, but their inaction has understandably drawn some criticism. But while they may not have made a big splash so far this offseason, they did make one smaller move that I find quite intriguing: adding right-handed pitcher Jharel Cotton.

Cotton found his way to the Twins after a series a setbacks that have, up to this point, derailed a once promising career. A former top 100 prospect with the Dodgers, he made 29 starts for the A’s in 2016 and ’17 before requiring Tommy John surgery during spring training in ’18. Hamstring surgery came next, just as he was working his way back in 2019. He spent the shortened pandemic season with the Cubs, but with a thick layer of rust needing to be knocked off and no minor league season to assist, he didn’t last long in Chicago. Finally, after three and a half long years, he returned to the big leagues late last season for the Rangers and more than looked the part of a quality pitcher with a 3.52 ERA and 3.72 FIP in 30.2 innings, albeit mostly in mop-up outings and entirely out of the bullpen.

The Rangers, afraid of his upcoming arbitration cost, cut him loose, and the Twins were able to work out a deal for only $700,000, barely above the league minimum. Luckily for Cotton, he’s now on a team that desperately needs quality arms; Minnesota’s rotation, as currently constructed, is shockingly thin and inexperienced.

Cotton may lack the shine of some of the younger arms like Ober and Ryan, but I think he represents a nice bit of upside, and when you take a look at some of the skills he displayed in his return last season, he starts to look like a guy that could pitch some valuable innings.
Read the rest of this entry »